Chapter 228
Chapter 228
Outside the windows, wind and snow raged unchecked.
Inside, silence reigned.
Yu Lang found that the harder he searched his mind for proof of their earlier visit, the more confused and indistinct his memories became.
This was more frightening than meeting a ghost!
“Lord Ren, I have a bad feeling. Something must have trapped us…”
“But I just… cannot remember what happened.”
Ren Fengjue felt the same. To be precise, the feeling had grown steadily stronger since they found the abandoned post station.
And as Yu Lang had said, although he could sense something was wrong, he simply could not remember what had happened.
Blurred thoughts. Tangled memories.
It did seem as though something had trapped them.
“Do not panic.”
Ren Fengjue knew that a moment like this called for calm thought more than ever. He tried to piece together his scattered memories.
“I feel certain we have been here before. We even spent a night in this villa.”
“The trouble must lie somewhere inside it…”
Following his words, Yu Lang thought carefully. A chill ran down his back. “It seems… we really did. I have some recollection of it too.”
“But if we have been here, why can we not remember?”
More troubling still, they had gone through it all again…
Did that mean they had already been trapped without knowing it?
Listening to their conversation, Yan Zhengchu and Axia began doubting themselves as well.
Daoist Yan simply took out an assortment of ritual implements to investigate. Yet even after he had tried every method he had for revealing a Yin Soul, the villa remained as still as water.
Only the wind and snow howled ceaselessly beyond the windows.
After surveying the room, Xia Ximo patted the Soul-Ferrying Lantern. Astonishingly, there was no response from inside it either.
Only then did she realize something.
Wuyou had been quiet throughout the journey, without uttering a word.
For such a chatterbox, that was deeply suspicious.
Could this place affect ghosts as well?
Frowning slightly, Xia Ximo used her soul power to pull Wuyou directly out of the lantern.
Wuyou immediately took human form upon emerging, but lay on the floor, fast asleep.
The others were all startled when they noticed their presence.
Yu Lang even cried out, “Daoist Master… is this a ghost your ritual implements revealed?”
Yan Zhengchu looked, then shook his head. “No…”
Strange, though. He remembered that this lantern spirit had had no form before…
Ren Fengjue had seen Wuyou before and volunteered an explanation for Yu Lang. “This is the Lamp Spirit.”
Yu Lang understood at once and asked quietly, “From that ugly lantern you were carrying the other day?”
Ren Fengjue immediately shot him a sidelong look.
Yu Lang hastily corrected himself. “I misspoke. The Lotus Lamp! A black Lotus Lamp!”
Seeing Wuyou fall asleep the moment they lay down, Xia Ximo went over and unceremoniously gave them two kicks.
Wuyou forced their eyes open and looked around. Finding so many pairs of eyes fixed on them, they sat bolt upright in alarm.
“How did I… get out here?”
They were about to hide inside the lantern again when Xia Ximo caught hold of them. “Stay where you are.”
Wuyou looked at Ren Fengjue, then Yan Zhengchu, and finally Xia Ximo. They began, “Mo… Mo…”
A sharp glance cut across them, frightening them into correcting themselves. “Miss Mo, it is not very appropriate for me to be out here, is it?”
Instead, Xia Ximo asked, “Have you not noticed anything wrong?”
Wuyou shook their head like a rattle drum and gave a long yawn. “All I know is that I am very sleepy…”
“Sleepy?”
“Wait! How could I be sleepy?”
As the Lamp Spirit, they had been asleep until the Underworld Administration summoned them.
Thus, after coming to the mortal world, they had no need for sleep.
Yet now they actually felt sleepy…
Wuyou was timid to begin with. At this realization, they grew even more terrified and hurried behind Xia Ximo.
“Mo… Mo, there is definitely something wrong with this place.”
“…”
Everyone in the hall watched Wuyou, in the form of a grown man, cower behind Xia Ximo. For a moment, they could only exchange speechless looks.
Xia Ximo simply dragged them out in front of her. “If nothing were wrong, I would not have called you out. Do not fall asleep again.”
Wuyou agreed and began puzzling over why they felt so sleepy…
Xia Ximo glanced at Ren Fengjue again. “If the problem really lies in this villa, then we may indeed have been here before, but never actually left.”
Yan Zhengchu stiffened. “Another Illusionary Realm!”
Xia Ximo nodded. “Let us work out how to break out of it.”
Yan Zhengchu went outside, to the other side of the window. Looking at the mountains surrounding the villa, all blanketed in white, he could not help frowning.
“If this really is an Illusionary Realm, it seems even more powerful than the Prajna Realm.”
“More importantly, when did we enter it? How could there have been no warning at all?”
Yu Lang said, “No wonder there is no trace of bandits, with such a large villa sitting here…”
But Ren Fengjue said, “Perhaps they did come, only to encounter the same thing we have.”
Yu Lang followed his reasoning. “My lord, if we really came here and spent a night, surely we must have left some traces in the villa?”
After thinking for a moment, Ren Fengjue pointed toward the side door. “Let us look in the inner courtyard.”
They left the hall for the courtyard at the back and went into the bedrooms to examine them.
Yet everywhere they looked, the beds, tables, chairs, and even cupboards were covered in dust.
There was no sign that anyone had been there.
Confronted with this, Yu Lang began doubting himself again.
“…Could it be that we have not been here?”
He looked at Ren Fengjue. “My lord, how can this be?”
Ren Fengjue, too, felt as though his memories had been altered.
But then an image flashed through his mind: while Axia was tidying one of the guest rooms, a chair had fallen onto his foot…
He immediately told Axia, “Take off your right shoe and have a look…”
Though puzzled, Axia obeyed.
Once his shoe and sock were off, the lantern light revealed a large bruise on the top of his foot, just as expected.
Even Axia was surprised. “No wonder my foot has been hurting. But how did this happen?”
Yu Lang asked, “It looks fresh. Where did you get it?”
Axia shook his head blankly. “I do not remember.”
Everyone looked at Ren Fengjue.
But Lord Ren said nothing and turned back toward the hall.
First, he carefully examined the floor by lantern light. Then he went up to a jade ornament and studied it closely.
Following behind him, Yu Lang could not help asking, “My lord, what have you found?”
Ren Fengjue replied, “All the traces are gone, including the footprints we left just now.”
The dust on the floor was thick, and they had all just come in from the snow. It was impossible to step on it without leaving footprints…
Yet now, apart from the prints they were making at that very moment, all their earlier footprints had vanished.